Mischief and All its Friends
by Oomaki-chan
Summary: Freshman year at college can be scary. Especially balancing your studies with your newly freed social life. But making new friends and making mistakes is why it's so fun. [NaLu] [Gruvia] [GaLe] (and others)
1. Chapter 1

Excitement and nervousness coursed through Lucy with every minute spent staring out the passenger seat window of her father's Chevy suburban. What had been two and a half hours into a three hour car ride was spent in all but silence. She had the radio speakers blasting local stations she had never heard of before, she would sing along if a song she knew came on, and her father wasn't complaining about the noise for once. Instead, he would occasionally try to talk over the music. His conversation topics were much more sentimental than usual, but Lucy didn't mind humoring him and listen to stories of her childhood just this once.

The blond turned her head to looked into the trunk of the truck. All of her boxes still sat perfectly in place. Nothing had fallen over yet, despite some risky turns on the highway. Lucy had a massive grin on her face. She looked back out the window. She had already seen the urban neighborhood she was so familiar with turn into country, city, and back again. When they passed the wooden sign on the side of the road saying "Welcome to Magnolia", she had all but screamed.

"I can't believe we're already almost there." Her father, Jude, began. "Why don't we take another loop around the city or something?"

Lucy looked at her father with a scowl. "Dad. You said you wouldn't stall."

"I know, I know." Jude stopped in the turn lane at an intersection. He glanced over at the GPS on the dash before making his turn. "I just wish you would think about your father a little more here."

"Oh please. You're being way too dramatic here" Lucy rolled her eyes. She then became distracted with the timer on the GPS saying that they were only twenty minutes away from their destination. The eighteen year old let out a deep breath. She focused on everything outside the window. Once more, the scenery turned from stores and restaurants to green fields and farms. Trees lined the sides of the road. As the countdown got lower and lower by the minute, the trees on her side were replaced with a large river. On the driver's side, they approached a large banner over a driveway.

 _WELCOME TO MAGNOLIA CITY COLLEGE!_

"We're here!" Lucy rolled down her window. She nearly jumped out of the car right then. Her father didn't make any comment as he turned into the driveway. A few feet up a male student wearing a bright red shirt, standing next to balloons, holding a sign waved at them. Jude pulled up next to them.

"Hey there you two!" The guy had one of the biggest smiles Lucy had ever seen on. "Are you moving in?"

"Yes!" The outburst was overflowing with anticipation.

"Great!" The student matched Lucy's enthusiasm. "What building are you looking for?"

Lucy had memorized every detail of her room assignments. She didn't even need to look for the paper she had printed out saying the building name or room number any more. "Fairy Tail Hall."

"That's where I stayed my freshman year. You'll have a blast there." The boy's face was full of approval. "Take the first turn on your right, then a left immediately, and you'll get to a circle. You can park there if there is space, you you can go around it to the parking lot. All the buildings are labeled, and there are a lot of other students wearing shirts like mine who can help you out if you have any questions."

"Thank you young man." Jude nodded and began driving. He mumbled the directions once over. The first turn came up very quickly, which means the second was even sooner. The road opened up into a round-about like instructed. The circle was surrounded by chaos. Students in red shirts matching the boy's from earlier guided parents and others who were moving in towards buildings and parking spaces. Many men were seen carrying large boxes and mini fridges while girls and women carried lighter looking bags and potted plants. Although there was what looked like a mother-daughter pair trying to carry a large TV across the grass hill in the middle of the circle.

Three matching buildings were oriented with their front doors facing the inside of the circle, while a fourth with very odd architecture took over what would have been the leftover space. Each of the three buildings had massive signs with their names hanging over the doors.

 _Fairy Tail Hall_

 _Lamia Scale Hall_

 _Quatro Cerberus Hall_

Jude wasn't able to find a spot to put the car in the circle, and instead drove into the parking lot and found the closest open space he could. He parked and cut off the engine. "Alright." He looked over at Lucy, who was already gathering her things she had with her in the front seat. "Alright."

Within seconds Lucy was out of the truck. Her white and blue striped backpack was on her shoulders, and she had her favorite doll tucked into the bed of her elbow. She walked around the the back of the truck. Her father had already beaten her to opening up the trunk and pulling out her large suitcase and placing it on the ground. Lucy grabbed hold of the handle and pulled the suitcase towards her as her father grabbed one of the boxes that were stacked up in the back.

"Let's just start with this." He said, looking towards his daughter. "Lead the way."

A large smile was plastered to her face as she marched back toward the circle. She followed the past to her assigned dorm building. The front door was held open with a cooler of water bottles. Lucy lifted the wheels of the suitcase over that first step and passed over that threshold. Once inside, there was a large lobby area. Four people in red shirts with the school logo on it stood at a foldout table in the middle. "Welcome to Fairy Tail." They called when they saw her and her father.

"Hello." Lucy said as she approached the table. "I'm moving in?"

"Right you are." A boy with short brown hair and a goatee spoke first. He reached out a hand to Lucy, who shook it quickly. "I'm Max, I'm one of the Resident Assistants for the boys halls here. What's your name?"

"Lucy." The blond said, suddenly feeling a little shy. "Lucy Heartfilia."

A girl with purple hair who sat at the table flipped through a clip board. "Alright, you are found. She's one of yours Mirajane. Room 314."

"Oh goodie!" A girl with long white hair stood up from her seat and clapped her hands together. "I'm the RA of your hall, so come find me if you have any questions about anything ever."

"Right. I'll do that." Lucy smiled. She looked over this woman named Mirajane. She looked very sweet with the way her long hair was loose down her back and her bangs were tied up. The smile on her face was also very welcoming.

"Here's your key." A guy with long green hair passed her the key. It was already attached to a lanyard with a keychain of school mascot, a red and black dragon, and a card holder. "Your ID is already in there. Here are some pamphlets that will help you out as well."

"Thank you." Lucy took the folder of papers that were given to her, and slipped her arm through the lanyard for the time being.

"I'll show you to your room, alright?" Mirajane walked around the table, and began walking towards one of the hallways that were on either side of the lobby. There was a set of wooden swinging doors that the trio passed through before entering the hallway. Almost immediately, the turned into a stairwell and went up the steps. "The third floor where we are is all girls, and the second floor is all boys. There are two single sex bathrooms of each floor, and then there is a gender neutral bathroom in the lobby." Mira explained. "Also, if you go into the basement, there's the common room, kitchen, and laundry room which are all open 24/7. There's a study room down there too, and that usually stays unlocked too."

"Can anyone use the kitchen?" Lucy asked.

"Yep." Mirajane nodded. She held open the door at the top of the stairs for Lucy and her father. "So if you want to use the refrigerator you're going to want to write your name of whatever you are putting in there."

The older student quickly took the lead and walked Lucy all the way to the end of the hall. Lucy noticed them passing by the bathroom. She also took note of the pieces of colorful construction paper shaped like what was either a fairy tail or a bird skiing on each door. Each had a name written on it. Some of the doors they passed were open, and Lucy could see girls rearranging furniture. She made eye contact with some of them, with whom she just smiled.

As per her luck, Lucy's room was the very last one on the hall. Her door was on the right corner, farthest from the bathroom. Lucy saw her name written in beautiful cursive on a pink symbol. Next to her door deck, on a second white one, was the name 'Levy'. Lucy knew that was the name of her roommate. The two had been talking on Facebook for ever since roommate assignments were released.

Mirajane got out of the way so that Lucy could do the honors of opening the door. The blonde felt her hands shake as she slipped the key into the lock. She turned it and heard a click, and the door popped open. Lucy pushed it open.

The room was pretty bleak on its own. There were two sets of furniture: Two beds that were raised so the mattresses were a little over three feet off the ground, two dressers with three drawers, two desks with chairs, and two wardrobes. Everything was made of wood, save for the mattresses.

"Your roommates not here yet." Mirajane said. "You actually got pretty lucky with this room though. Corner rooms are a little bigger than the rest, and you get two windows. Feel free to move around any of the furniture. It's your room after all."

"Thanks Mirajane." Lucy smiled as the white haired woman left the room.

"Alright then." Jude spoke for the first time since entering the hallway. "Welcome to your first dorm room." He put down the box he had been carrying and hugged his girls side. "Your first college decision is to pick which side of the room you want. I'll go start getting other boxes from the truck."

"I'll come help you in a minute." Lucy smiled. She began looking over the furniture option. She settled on placing her backpack on the bed against the left wall, thus taking claim over all the items on the right. Her dresser was already placed under her bed, which was good for optimizing space. Her desk was arranged so that the back was pushed up against the wall. The two wardrobed were on opposite sides of the door. The setup of the other set of furniture was identical, only a second window was in the middle of her wall, at the foot of the bed. The second window was in between the beds, over an air conditioning unit.

A large grin was spread over Lucy's face. She quickly ran out of the room and down stairs to help her father. She passed him walking back into the building. He was carrying another box. Lucy headed to the truck, and pulled one more box towards her and hoisted it into her arms. She looked over what was left in the trunk. One more box besides the one she was carrying, a mini-fridge, and a laundry hamper filled with random toiletries, snacks, and roll of posters. Lucy was thankful she hadn't packed too many things. She had been so worried about room size, that she made sure only to pack what she knew she needed. Now she was starting to think she had been too cautious.

It took three more trips to bring everything into her new room. Jude ended up enlisting the help of Max to get the mini-fridge up the stairs. They were able to push it into the space under her bed as well, and found an outlet there to plug it in and get it going. "Well, that's everything you have, right?" He asked his daughter.

"Yeah. I don't think I missed anything." Lucy kneeled on the ground and unzipped her suitcase.

"I'll go take one more look, then lock up the truck."

"Sure." Lucy began taking her clothes out of the suitcase and organizing them between her dresser and wardrobe. The drawers were smaller than what she was used to. Because of this, Lucy ended up choosing to hang up most of her shirts rather than folding them and using her acquired tetris skills to somehow fit them into a drawer. As she worked of filling up drawers, there was a knocking on the door.

A small girl with short blue hair and wearing an orange sundress walked into the room. She was carrying a pile of books in her hands. "Lucy, right?"

"Levy?" Lucy ran up to the girl. Both girls smiled widely. Levy placed her books on the first surface she could find, then the two ran together and hugged. "I can't believe you got here before me. I thought I had left pretty early."

"I left at the earliest possible minute." Lucy smiled. She looked over her roommate's shoulder to see a man and woman, both with dark hair, came into the room.

"Oh my." The woman sat down in one of the desk chairs. "This is such a nice little room!"

"Mother, are you not even going to pretend to help?" Levy turned around, puffed out her cheeks and threw a hand to her hip.

"I am helping." The woman said. "I'm planning out what your room will look like."

"Oh boy." Levy sighed.

"Do you need help carrying anything up here?" Lucy offered.

Levy looked at the blond for a brief second, then to the rest of the room. "Nah, it's fine. You keep unpacking. It's not going to take long to get all of my stuff here."

"It would take less time if you didn't need so many books." The man, who Lucy assumed was Lavy's father, dropped a large trunk in the middle of the floor.

"Yeah. Like that would happen." Levy slid the trunk closer to her so it was more out of the way. She then followed her father out the door to go get the next items from their car. Lucy took the opportunity to get back to unpacking. At this point, her father had returned and was sitting in she second desk chair. He had offered to help Levy's father, but the man said he had control of it all. It wasn't until Levy's father same upstairs with an IKEA bookshelf to set up that Jude actually was able to help. In this time, Lucy had set up her bed spread. She only had white sheets, but she had a very fluffy, pink comforter, and a cranberry body pillow.

After finishing with her bed, Lucy decided to take a little break. She sat on top of her bed and watched at Levy still moved boxes around the room, looking for a good spot for the bookshelf.

"Now where the hell is this thing going to fit?" The blue haired girl asked.

"Um…." Lucy tried to think about it too. The book shelf was set of as a total of eight square box shapes, four up, two across. "We can try moving furniture around so it will fit on the wall?"

"Do you think the dresser will fit inside the wardrobe?" Levy's mother asked the room. Everyone stared at the woman for a moment before metaphorical light bulbs appeared over everyone's head. It didn't take much effort to relocate the dresser that had been under Levy's bed to inside of the wooden closet. It took even less to turn the bookshelf onto its side and slide it under the bed. It was a snug fit, but it worked. "Look at that. Magic."

Levy rolled her eyes, then continued unpacking all of her clothes and started working on her books. "Action books can go here, the romance can take up these two, and mystery is going to need two, but that's fine because language books only take up half." She muttered to herself as what looked like random novels were thrown in what would have been random places to anyone else. Lucy loved books very much, and had brought many of her own, but not nearly as many as Levy.

Lucy watched Levy for only a few more minutes before her father stood up from the desk chair he had stolen. "Well, I've got to be getting back. It'll be a long drive back on my own."

"Oh." Lucy got off her bed and followed her father out of the room. More students had filled into their rooms at this point. Some looked like they were finished moving in already, while others scrambled to get their items out of the hallway. Jude led the way back to the car.

"I'll miss you Lucy." He smiled down at his daughter.

"I know Dad." Lucy hugged her father.

"Call me sometime?"

"I will when I can."

"I'll have an intern drive your car up by next weekend or something."

"Thanks for that."

"Alright….." Jude looked at the truck in silence. "One more hug?"

Lucy laughed and granted her father's wish. "I'll see you in a few months. It'll go by before you know it."

"I doubt that." Jude smiled at his daughter and climbed into the driver's seat of the car. "Stay safe, make good choices, and don't spend too much time in the boys hall."

"You know there's an all guys dorm right across the circle right?" Lucy watched as her father's face turned white.

"You definitely can't go there."

"Sure thing Dad."

It took a few more minutes of convincing her father that everyone was going to be just fine before he finally drove away. She made sure to wave until she couldn't see the car anymore. The second he wa out of sight, Lucy began jumping up and down, and throwing her arms out with excitement. "Yes!"


	2. Chapter 2

Not long after Lucy's father left, Levy's parents did too. There were a lot more tears than there had been between Lucy and her father. Levy's mother looked like she could water the flowers outside with her tears. The second the two left, Levy and Lucy looked each other.

"Excuse me." Levy cleared her throat. "Fuck, shit, dammit." Both girls started laughing.

"Are you not allowed to curse at home?" Lucy asked.

"I can't even say "darn" around my dad." The blue haired girl reached into one of the boxes she was still working on unpacking and pulled out notebooks and packs of pens. "My mom curses like a sailor though. It's weird."

"Huh." Lucy looked back at the wall space above her bed. She was trying to figure out how to arrange all of the pictures and posters she brought. There was a bit of embarrassment thinking about which ones she actually brought. Most of them were just super artistic, classic white girl posters, but then there was her awkward band posters and pictures her friends from highschool had given her. She picked through which ones she actually wanted on her wall. She settled on putting to large poster of the Eiffel Tower in the space at the head of her bed. Then she pulled out the four, one foot by one foot cork boards in adorable painted picture frames. She arranged them on either side of the window over her bed. The rest of the posters ended up wherever they could fit. It ended up being a pretty cute arrangement in her opinion.

Suddenly there was a knocking on their door. Both girls turned to see two people standing by the door. One was a girl with short white hair, the other was a boy with bright pink, spiked hair. "Hello." The girl greeted.

"Hey." Lucy responded for both her and Levy. "Can we help you?"

"Ours parents already left so we're acting like hot shit." The boy grinned, walking right into the room. "This is a cool setup you have here." He looked around at the arrangement.

"Natsu, don't just walk into a girls' room like that!" The white haired girl slapped the boy's shoulder, but he didn't seem to mind. "Sorry about him. He has no boundaries."

"It's fine." Levy smiled, then went back to organizing her desk drawers. "The door was open after all."

Lucy looked over both of the people who had just entered her room. The girl looked very tidy. Short white hair was well kept and tucked behind her ears. She wore a yellow tee-shirt and jean shorts, but considering the temperature outside, it was well warranted. The boy next to her looked much more _wild_. Lucy's eyes immediately fixated on his pink hair. She couldn't tell it if was natural or dyed; it was so hard to tell with some people. Even if his pink hair had been perfectly normal, there was also the massive tattoo on his right arm. The black tank top he was wearing showed it off well. From what she could tell, it looked like a red dragon head mounted on his shoulder. It spat out flames which circled around the guy's upper arm, and ended inches away from his elbow. It was insanely detailed, and contrasted completely against his black tanktop and shorts, and the white scarf that he was for some reason wearing despite the heat.

"Natsu! Where the hell are you?" A voice yelled down the hall.

"Crap. I gotta go." The pink haired boy turned tail and ran out of the room. Lucy could hear more yelling in the hallway, and it just sounded like a bunch of dumb insults though.

"Sorry about him. His brain doesn't function like a normal human beings." The girl, who was still in the room, commented. "Oh, that was Natsu by the way. And my name is Lisanna." She introduced herself.

"Nice to meet you Lisanna." Lucy hopped off of her bed and went to greet the girl. "My name's Lucy."

"I'm Levy." The bluenette added in.

"Nice to meet you. Welcome to MCC." Lisanna said. It took Lucy a few seconds to realize that those were the initials of the school. She probably should have known that considering they were printed on almost every handout and pamphlet she'd ever received. "I was just going up and down the halls with Natsu and introducing myself to whoever was around."

"That's cool." Lucy said. "I'll probably do the same eventually."

"You could also just wait until the building wide meeting." The white haired girl noted. "Mira asked me to tell people about that. It's at seven tonight in the lobby. Basically, everyone who lives in the building sits around and the RA's are going to talk to us."

Lucy and Levy exchanged a look. "Sounds cool I guess." Levy shrugged. "It's going to be pretty crowded though."

"Yes and no. Not everyone is moving in today after all. It's pretty much just going to be us first years."

Levy made a little 'O' shape with her mouth. She continued to stack books on top of her desk, since there was no longer room on the book shelf she had brought. There was a moment of silence as she looked around at what space was left in the room. "Do you think I'd be able to get one of those 'over-the-bed' bookshelves?"

"I don't see why not." Lucy shrugged. "What we really need is a carpet or something though."

"You could probably check out the school store for that." Lisanna said. "It's just at the Campus Center. Do you know where that is? I can show you the way if you want."

Lucy shook her head. "Thanks for the offer, but I think we can figure it out. I sort of remember from tours."

"Alright." Lisanna smiled. "It was great meeting you guys then." The white haired girl began walking out of the room, but stopped in the doorway. "Oh. I'm in room 338. Come find me if you ever want to hang out." With that, she waved her goodbye and left the room.

Once Levy had come up with a way of organizing all her leftover books, Lucy helped pin up some of the posters her roommate had. Her favorite was a large one that they put in the middle what had pictures of bookshelves in the back, and large cursive letters that read ' _My room doesn't just look like a library, it smells like one too_ '. It didn't take too much time to secure the posters and photos to the wall, despite the low quality wall tacks, and then the two newly made college girls looked around their shared room. Levy's side of the room had an opposing color scheme to Lucy's, but still blended in quite well. The bed had light blue fitted sheets and pillowcases and a gray comforter that had a white stripes crossing to make gray diamonds. A few stuffed animals sat at the head of the bed. If Lucy had learned anything in her college research, it was that your bed is the defining factor in your room style.

Lucy pulled her cell phone out of the side pocket of her backpack and flashed on the screen. It was only about three in the afternoon, and both of them were already fully situated. "What do you want to do now?"

"We could just walk around like….." Levy paused for a moments. "Is it bad that I already forget that girl's name?"

"Nah. You're good." Lucy said as she when into her wardrobe and took out a small brown purse. She threw the lanyard with her keys and ID inside along with her phone. "I just remember that it started with an 'L'."

"Glad to know I'm not alone." The blue haired bookworm hopped off of her bed and landed on the tile floor with a thud. She located the little blue purse that she had moved in with and slung it over her shoulder. "I'm so bad with names."

The pair left their room, locking it behind them. They started walking down the girl's hallway, poking their heads into any of the open doors. Most of the girls they met were still hectically trying to move all of their things into their rooms to really chat. Lucy and Levy ended up going all the way around the building until they found the room of the girl they had talked to before. They saw from the door decks that the girl's name was Lisanna, and she was rooming with some other girl named Juvia. Lisanna was in her room, organizing the drawers of her desk. One side of the room, the one that Lisanna was sitting at, was covered in dark purples and black and had only a few photos taped on the wall. The other side of the room was much better decorated. The general theme would probably be "water". The bed spread was blue and turquoise, and there was a large wall decal of a sailboat and anchor on the wall over the bed. White christmas lights were strung through the ceiling tiles to go over that half of the room as well.

"This is such a cute space." Levy said as she stepped into the room, admiring the organization of everything. "Is your roommate still moving in?"

"Nope." Lisanna shook her head. "She finished up a little while ago, then said she was going to take a walk around."

"Well, we're thinking of sitting outside and watching the chaos." Lucy looked at a mirror on the wall and fixed her hair. She took it out of the pony tail it had been in and let it hang naturally over her shoulders. They she turned back to the other girls in the room. "Do want to come with?"

Lisanna took a moment to think over the offer. "You know what, I'll come join you when I'm done with this."

"Alright. See you in a bit then." Lucy and Levy excused themselves from the room. It took a moment to locate a stairwell that would take them back to the lobby. When they had finally gotten out the front door, the two girls wandered around the circle until they found an empty patch of grass in front of Fairy Tail Hall that they could sit down on. They watched a lot of families scramble to get as much out of the backs of their cars as they could. One group had a massive U-Haul trailer hooked on to the back of their already massive truck. They seemed to be heading into Quatro Cerberus carrying not one, but two flat screen TVs.

"Boys." Levy shook her head. "I don't get it."

"Not at all." Lucy agreed with her roommate.

"Natsu! Get your ass back here and say goodbye to your sister!" A large booming voice nearly silenced the entire circle. A tall man with dark red hair was standing on the sidewalk that lead to the entrance of Fairy Tail. Next to him stood a small girl with long blue hair, who clung to the leg of his pants.

"I told you I was coming you old fart." A barely familiar pink haired boy made his way towards the man. When he got close the little girl ran up to him and gave him a big hug. "I thought you guys had already left." After that point, any words that any member of that family said were too quiet for Lucy to make out properly. But she was certain she could see that the little girl was sad to see her brother go. The pinkette let his sister climb onto his back, before he started running up and down the path towards the parking lot. The man, that must have been his father, followed behind.

"I can't imagine having to say goodbye to a brother or sister." Lucy brought up when the family was out of sight. "It was hard enough saying it to my father."

"Are you an only child?" Levy asked.

"Yep." Lucy nodded.

"Same. My mother's attached to me enough though." The smaller girl smiled, remembering how just moments ago how hard it was to get her mother to leave the new dorm room. "I don't know what she's going to do without me actually…"

"Maybe she'll get a dog?" The suggestion wasn't too out there. Many parents would try and compensate for losing a child to higher education, and often times the best idea they could come up with was to get a fuzzy replacement. Lucky for her, Lucy knew she didn't have to worry about that with her father. He wasn't the type to suddenly get emotionally attached to another living thing. She wouldn't be too surprised if he bought himself a boat though.

The boy with pink hair, Natsu, if Lucy remembered his name right, came back into view, walking out of the parking lot alone. He stopped for a moment at the corner of the sidewalk, scratching the back of his head. He was clearly wondering what to do next. Lucy watched him suddenly run towards the door of Fairy Tail Hall, where he met with Lisanna, who was exiting the building. The two exchanged a few words. Lisanna looked around the circle, then pointed towards where Lucy and Levy were sitting. The pair walked over to the two girls.

"Hello again." Lisanna smiled as she sat down on the grass in front of the other two girls.

"Hey." Lucy nodded.

"What's up?" Natsu grinned, standing above them. He wore a really toothy grin. "My name's Natsu by the way. I don't think I ever actually said it before."

"I already told them your name." Lisanna explained, rolling her eyes.

"What? Why would you do that?" The guy grinded the toe of his sandals into the grass. "I wanted to have a super cool introduction too."

"Since when did you care about first impressions?" The only response to the comment was Natsu sticking out his tongue before dropping to sit cross-legged on the ground.

"Anyways, what were your guys' names?" Natsu asked. "Luigi and Levi was it?"

Lucy couldn't tell if Natsu was joking around by suggesting both her and Levy had boy names. She looked at him, trying to figure out his expression, but he looked like he was already focused in on a stick he picked up off the ground. "Not quite… My name's Lucy."

"And I'm Levy. I guess that's a least kind of close though." The blue haired girl laughed. She seemed to be brushing off Natsu's comments as a joke.

"I don't know how many times I can apologize for him." Lisanna sighed.

"I don't need anybody doing that for me Lisanna." Natsu grumbled.

"So…." Lucy jumped back into the conversation. "Did you two know each other before coming here?" She couldn't help but notice that the pair were unusually close for day one.

"We went to highschool together." Lisanna explained. "I actually didn't know we were going to be at the same school again until orientation over the summer."

"Well I hope you guys at least get along." Levy said. She leaned back until her back was on the grass. "That would suck if you didn't."

"You're more worried about getting along with your roommate." Lisanna jabbed Natsu's arm with the point of her elbow.

The pink haired guy swatted away the attacking limb. "Shut up." He had a scowl on his face. "Not my fault he's a prick."

"How do you already have problems with your roommate?" Lucy raised an eyebrow. She was honestly impressed more than shocked. Today was the first possible day to move in for new students, and unless they had gotten into a fight over the summer, they would have needed to get into an argument within the last few hours.

"I put up a few pictures of my cat, and he was all "what kind of guy has a cat?"! Can you believe him?" Natsu was clearly very passionate about this. He was staring right at Lucy, clearly expecting her to make some sort of reaction.

"That's rude." Lucy finally said.

"Isn't it?" The male huffed air out his nose and crossed his arms over his chest. "It's fine though. My sister showed him a picture of my cat and her cat together, and he had to admit that they are both cute as hell." Natsu dug around his pockets and pulled out his cell phone. He hit the button that lit the screen up, and immediately showed it to Lucy and Levy. The backdrop was a picture of two cats. One was white with a pink ribbon tied in a bow on its tail, the other was bright blue.

Both girls stared at the picture, then back at Natsu. "Natsu….." Lucy began. "Why that one blue?"

"That one's mine." The grin on Natsu's face spread from ear to ear. "He fell in some paint once when he was a kitten, and it looked really awesome, so I dye his fur."

"Right…" From what Lucy could tell, Natsu was just about as logical as a five year old. First impressions could be wrong though, or so she hoped. "What's his name?"

"Happy." Natsu said, returning his phone to his pocket. "And my sister's cat's name is Carla."

"It's cool that you have pets." Levy commented. She was still laying down on the grass, probably not too keen on moving anytime soon. "Lucy and I already figured out my parents are probably going to get a dog to replace me now."

The four sat in the grass for a while longer. Their conversations were rather sporadic, most of it starting from reactions to the people who were still moving into the dorm buildings, or Natsu's overly randomized statements. Lucy couldn't tell if that boy was listening to what others were saying or not. He seemed to just be off in his own imagination one minute, than overly involved the next. Levy had finally sat upright. She enlisted in Lucy's help to remove the grass and leaves from the back of her shirt and hair.

"Lisanna!" The group of freshman all turned their heads to see Mirajane and one of the other Fairy Tail RA's, a guy with long green hair, stood on the sidewalk that passed in from of the dorms and went around the circle.

"What is it?" Lisanna called back.

"We're going to get dinner. Do you and your friends want to come with us?"

Lisanna looked back to the group she was with. "What do you guys say?"

"Hell yeah!" Natsu jumped up to his feet immediately. "I'm starving."

Lucy looked at the clock on her phone and saw that is was only a little past five o'clock. That being said, she was feeling a little hungry. She and her father has gotten an early lunch so that they would get to the college campus at a good time, so it had been a while since she had eaten. "Sounds good to me." Lucy stood up off the ground, then helped Levy up too.

"Yeah. Who could turn down food?" Levy laughed.

The two groups met on the grass in the middle of the circle. "Shall we?" Mirajane then began leading the way.

"Have you guys eaten in the dining hall here yet?" Lisanna asked Levy and Lucy, walking side by side with them.

"We had to during orientation." Levy said.

The now decent sized group followed the sidewalk between Quatro Cerberus and the strange looking artistic building next to it. The sidewalk turned into a brick pathway as they crossed over a hill. From the top of the hill they could easily see that is led up to a large pond.

"It's really cool, isn't it?" Natsu said, suddenly appearing next to Lucy.

"Huh? Oh, yeah. It really is." The blonde agreed.

"Come on." Natsu grabbed Lucy's wrist without warning, and began running to the pond. They stopped right in front of it, where there was a separation on the path. On the left, the brick led up a hill towards a large brick building. The majority of the people who were on the pathway seemed to be going in that direction. The right looked like it just walked around the pond, towards a forest area. It wasn't until Lucy looked again that she saw another brick building, similar looking to the other three dorm buildings, peeking out from behind bushes and trees. But what really grabbed Lucy's attention was what was directly across the pond. While that body of water was pretty on its own, on the completely opposite end, and across the piece of road that was there, was the water front.

A large river created a coastline on the small college campus. It was one of the main reasons why Lucy came to this school. From where she stood now, Lucy could also see the little white boat house that was right by the water front. "I love it here."

"Don't ya?"

"Hey Flamebrain, move it." An unfamiliar voice made Lucy turn around. When she did, she saw a tall guy with dark hair, and a big frown on his face.

"Ey, how's it hanging Icebreath?" Natsu stuck out his tongue.

"Oh, you know, slightly to the left."

Lucy cringed her nose when she realized the meaning of the comment. She then looked out for Levy and saw the smaller girl just a few feet away, starting up the hill. Lucy ran after her, rejoining the original group. Natsu and the other guy followed behind.

Levy looked back at the new guy. "Who's this?"

"Gray." The dark haired boy said. "I have the….. _pleasure_ of being assigned to the same room as this pink haired menace."

"Oh. You're the roommate who hates cats." Levy's comment made Gray raise an eyebrow.

"You're both in my hall, aren't you?" The green haired guy that Mirajane had been with, his name was Freed based on the nametag sticker on his shirt, said to the only other males in the group. He was another RA in their dorm building. "I hope you won't end up being my problem children."

"We'll cause as many problems for you as we can." Natsu grinned.

"Great." Freed's smile was replaced with a frown and furrowed brow.

"Oh, I'm sure they're both be lovely." Mirajane clapped her hands together.

The brick pathway led in between two brick buildings. One was a library, the other was known as the Campus Center. There was a large patio with tables and benches in front of the Campus Center, with entrances on either side. A small staircase outside led to a balcony that stretched the length of the second floor.

"Alright, well," Mirajane turned to Lisanna. "You don't have to eat with me if you don't want to, but you're certainly welcome to join us."

Lisanna looked over the group of fellow freshman. "Yeah, maybe not tonight."

"Don't forget about the Hall Meeting tonight." Mirajane and Lisanna hugged before the group split apart by just enough steps to distinguish the difference. They all headed up the stairs to the balcony, and went through the door to enter the building.

The dining hall took up the entirety of the top floor. The hallway had windows on one side, showing the balcony and a lovely view of the library and path. The other side was lined with small wooden cubies. Students and parents like placed their bags and any other personal belongings inside while they eat in the dining hall. It was one of those peculiar things about this college. People could leave their bag unattended while they eat, and no one would bat an eye or worry about someone taking their things. It was an unusual school though.

* * *

"Alright now, settle down all of you." Max looked like he was about at his wits end. It was past seven o'clock, the time scheduled for the mandatory meeting for the residents of Fairy Tail Hall, and Laki and Freed were still running around trying to track down all of the first years. The ones that actually managed to show up relatively on time were rather rambunctious.

"Poor guy." Levy leaned over a whispered to Lucy. The two sat on the floor; they came too late to get a seat on one of the couches or chairs in the lobby.

"I feel sorry for him." Lucy agreed. "At least this isn't the all-guys dorm."

"That's true."

"I'm not allowed to curse at you lot, so hurry up and shut up before I'm tempted to." Max finally yelled. The upperclassman seemed to be losing his patience. He saw Laki walk through the double doors into the hallway, with two more students following after her.

"That may or may not be everyone." Laki said, standing beside the other Residence Assistants. Freed had made his way in from the opposite hallway. "My hall's all here, give or take six."

"I'm only missing two." Freed said, looking over the crowd.

"Well, we're going to start this meeting in true MCC fashion, so fifteen minutes late." Max finally started. "Welcome to Fairy Tail Hall folks. The four of us all did introductions already, and I know it's a pain 'cause there are a lot of you, but you all get to go around the room and say a quick 'hello'." There was a collective groan throughout the room.

"Oh come on, it's fun to know your neighbors." Mira cheered. "Who would like to go first?"

"I'll do it! I'll go first!" Natsu's excitement did not go unnoticed. The pinkette's hand was in the air before the sentence even came out of Mirajane's mouth. "I'm Natsu. Natsu Dragneel. I live with the guy sitting around without a shirt on over there, in room 246. I'm gonna be a chemistry major, and my spirit animal is either a dragon, or a cat with wings, I can't decide."

"Who the hell said anything about spirit animals?" Levy asked, whispering back to Lucy.

"I'm more surprised about the chemistry thing." Lucy responded. She wasn't paying attention to the guy who went after Natsu. "Sciences are weird."

"I don't get them at all." Levy and Lucy spent the time chatting to each other, judging people based on what they decided to say as their introductions, and, of course, physical appearances.

"Juvia Lockser." A girl with very pale skin and long blue hair began. She had a very soft voice, and the entire room had to try to be quite in order to hear her properly. "Psychology is the most likely area of study Juvia will study. Juvia doesn't have anything else to say."

"Poor thing. I wonder if she's shy?" Lucy mentioned. Her eyes began searching out the next person to go, but it seemed all eyes were starting to focus on her. "Oh great." She took a deep breath before starting. "My name is Lucy, and I'm an English major. I want to be a writer some day. I'm not sure if I'm going to minor in anything yet, we'll see." Once she finished, Lucy nudged her roommate to go next.

"Alright, I get it. Nice to meet you all. I'm Levy. I'm also an English major, but I'm probably also going to a history major, and but I also want to do museum studies or archeology. But at the same time I might just take a lot of language classes instead. We'll see."

"Smooth." Lucy giggled when her roommate was done.

"Oh shut up." The blue haired girl puffed out her cheeks. "Like you did any better."


	3. Chapter 3

Lucy pulled a notebook and pencil case out of her backpack, arranging them on her desk. She looked at her watch and immediately groaned. She knew she was going to regret signing up for a class at eight in the morning. Unfortunately, when signing up for classes over the summer, she didn't have many options; she could thank freshman time slots for that. IT especially wasn't encouraging when she had to wake up, get dressed, and get ready for the day, but Levy, her roommate, got to sleep. Still, she was excited. This was her first class as a college student, and the class would hopefully be fun too. It was a class all about studying old literature, one of the first classes in the English major.

One thing she loved about Magnolia College was that there were no large lecture halls. Instead, most classes were in regular classrooms, with a whiteboard at the front. Lucy had made sure to leave her dorm with time to spare. The academic building her class was in was Wolfheim Hall, which was just across the circle from Fairy Tail. The closeness of the building made it so that she got to the classroom pretty early on. From the desk that she chose out, second row and close to the door, she watched different people file in. Some were faces that she recognized from orientation, or that building meeting, but most of the other students she had never seen before.

In total, there were maybe twenty to thirty people in the classroom by the time eight rolled around and the professor walked in. It was an older lady, who would have been rather short if not the the heels she was wearing. She introduced herself and passed around a copy of the syllabus for the semester, before taking roll call. The majority of the class was spent talking about what the course would cover. They also went through the long list of books that would be required for this class, all of which were sitting neatly on Lucy's desk in her room. She wrote down different notes about how homework would be structured, when the first assignments were due, and so on and so forth.

When the class did end, Lucy packed up her things and headed out. She had a little over an hour before her next class, and decided to go get breakfast while she could. Thankfully, she had made the decision to pack up what she would need for her next class a well. So, Lucy headed for the Campus Center. It was now just passed nine o'clock, so more people seemed to be out. Some faces she recognized from orientation, but most of the people she passed on the path were complete strangers. It wasn't until she stepped into the dining hall that she actually became self conscious about how few people she knew.

The night before Lucy had eaten with her new friends. They had all ventured together in a large herd of people who were terrified of eating alone. It was great at the time, but Lucy quickly forgot that she didn't have the same eating schedule as these newly obtained friends. After piling a generous helping of eggs and tofu sausage on her plate, she ventured over to where the hall filled with tables and chairs. The blonde let her eyes scan the room briefly. She didn't know anyone there. Not wanting to seem like she was lost, or desperate for people to sit with, Lucy found an empty table and sat herself down on the corner to eat on her own. She wasn't the only one eating alone, so it wasn't out of place. She propped her phone up against the salt and pepper shakers, scrolling through various social media apps while she shoveled food into her mouth. She was halfway done when she heard her name get called out.

"Lucy! Hey Lucy!" Standing right next to the table was none other than Natsu. His pink hair stuck out in all sorts of directions. Clearly, he hadn't bothered to run a brush through it or anything that morning. He was carrying two plates, one in each hand, with a cup of juice jammed into the bend of his elbow. "Mind if I sit with ya?"

The girl covered her mouth before speaking through bites of scrambled egg. "Rrr. Oh fur eet." She added a nod just in case he didn't understand her full-mouth speak.

Natsu carefully put his plates and cup down before sitting. "Lisanna'll be over in a bit too. She's waiting on pancakes."

"Alright." The pair began eating in silence. Lisanna came over, as expected, finding them pretty easily before sitting in the seat next to Natsu.

"So did you have your first class yet?" The white haired girl asked.

"Yeah. Just finished it a little while ago." Lucy smiled. "It wasn't bad, but it looks like it's going to be a lot of reading. Although I'm trying to do an English major, so I basically signed up for that…"

"That's true." Lisanna laughed before taking in a huge bite of pancake.

"What about you guys? Did you do your first class yet?"

"Not yet." Natsu said, whipping syrup from his face with the back of his hand. "I've got my first class after this."

"What class?" Lucy inquired. She checked the time on her phone, making a mental note that she had twenty minutes to finish up her breakfast.

"Chemistry! I'm super excited for it." A large grin plastered itself from ear to ear on Natsu's face.

"I have never seen someone so excited about a chemistry class before…"

"He's just excited about having lab tomorrow." Lisanna rolled her eyes.

"Lab's are a lot of fun. Especially when stuff goes wrong." Natsu's swiped a finger across one of his two plates, both of which had been completely cleaned off. "Well… Only if it means something catching on fire… If you just fuck up your titrations then that sucks."

"That's the worst!" Lisanna, who apparently understood what that meant, quickly agreed. "But yeah. I'm about to go to my first biology class."

"I've heard bio here is a living hell." Lucy said. She wasn't wrong too. Principles of Biology, POB as the cool kids called it, had a reputation for being one of the hardest entry level courses this school offered. The drop rate for the first week of classes was massive, and the fail rate was even higher. Lucy couldn't imagine how anyone could possibly want to be a biology major knowing that the first class was designed to make you fail.

Lisanna just shrugged though. Apparently she didn't seem bothered by this. "I just need to study my ass off and I'll be ok."

"Well, I got to get heading to my next class." Lucy gathered all of her dished and stacked them on top of each other before standing up. The other two at the table did the same. The three then walked over to the where the drop-off for dirty dishes was. "What building are you guys going to?"

"My class is in Warrod, and Natsu's is in Gran Doma." Lisanna explained. Those were the two buildings dedicated to all of the science and math related classes. They were right next to each other, and created their own little courtyard. The two buildings were on north campus, right by the gym, and were the northern most academic buildings. The only structures past them were upperclassmen housing.

"Oh really? I have a math class in Warrod next too." Lucy said, exiting the dining hall and locating her backpack in the cubbies that lined the hallway. She slung it over her shoulder and waited to make sure the others she was with were ready as well before they all left the building. "I'm really not excited for it though."

"What classes are you taking this semester?" Lisanna asked.

"My english class, calculus, astronomy 101, and one of those freshman seminars." The blonde went through her schedule. "I'm just trying to get through as many of those gen ed requirements as I can this semester."

"I'm working more on getting pre-med stuff out of the way." Lisanna shrugged. "I figured I can get the general stuff done as I go."

The three kept chatting as they walked up the path. They all said their goodbyes at the entrance to Warrod Hall. Natsu had to continue to the next building over, and while Lisanna and Lucy were in the same building, the math and biology departments were completely separated from each other.

Calculus was going to be hell. Lucy knew that very well. She just wasn't a math person. She was just going to have to slug through that class the best she could. Unlike her first class, the math department apparently didn't believe in syllabus week. There was only a brief introduction by the professor before jumping right into the material. Lucy couldn't get out of that class faster if she wanted to. The second it ended she was out the door.

Unfortunately, she had two classes back to back. She had ten minutes to get from Warrod Hall, back to Wolfheim. The building where only about a three minute walk apart though, which helped. The best part was that this was her last class of the day. While the layout of Wolfheim was a little confusing in comparison to other buildings, it didn't take long for Lucy to find her classroom.

Several faces in the room were familiar to her this time around. Though, that was probably because this was her freshman seminar. The class was designed for first years to get used to college homework and the different resources the school had, so the topic changed depending on what professor taught it. The subject for this one was Family, Marriage, and Religion. It wasn't anything that Lucy was particularly interested in, but it fit her schedule, and didn't have too awkward of a time slot seeing as it would end right before the ideal lunch time.

"Oh hey. It's you again." Natsu walked in the classroom, a smile on his face. He immediately walked up to Lucy and sat in the seat beside her. "You're in this one too? That's awesome!"

"Funny how that works." Lucy laughed. She felt like she was running into this guy everywhere she went lately. "How did chemistry go?"

"It was pretty cool." A glint appeared in the boy's onyx eyes. "We just did introduction and played a game about the Periodic Table, but she also talked about what kind of stuff we're going to be doing in lab and I'm really fired up now!"

"What kind of games can you play with the Periodic Table of Elements?" Lucy quirked an eyebrow.

"It was kind of a puzzle sort of thing." Natsu explained the activity as he pulled out a notebook and a pen from his bag. It sounded more tedious than fun, but to each their own.

The professor who walked in was a small lady with a slight accent. She immediately jumped into making the entire class do a round of introductions. There were only maybe fourteen people in the whole class, and she explained that it was going to a very intimate class because of that. As they went over the syllabus, Lucy realized that his class might require a lot of sharing about her family. There was a brief moment of panic. She didn't need people knowing that stuff, it wasn't anything she wanted to share anyways. Thankfully, before her mind could start bringing up everything she definitely didn't want to think about while she was in class, the professor reassured everyone that no one would be forced to share anything they didn't want to. The only other thing that surprised her was the small sigh of relief she thought she heard come from Natsu. He seemed like such a happy-go-lucky person. Although, maybe even he had things he didn't exactly want others to know. Was it weird that that was reassuring?

Nothing was more liberating than finally being done with classes for the day. The moment the seminar class was let out, Lucy felt a huge relief flood over her. She had successfully finished her very first day of college classes!

"Hey Natsu." She turned to the pink haired mess next to her. "Are you up for lunch real quick?"

"I'm always up for food." The guy threw his bag haphazardly over his shoulder.

"Awesome. I'm just gonna text Levy and see what she's up to. I'm pretty sure she doesn't have a class right now." Lucy took out her phone from her pocket.

"Do we just want to tell her to meet us there?" Natsu asked, peering over Lucy's shoulder at the message she sent.

"Yeah probably." Lucy fit that into her text message before hitting send. The second she did, she began walking. Natsu quickly came to walk beside her. "Even though I ate breakfast, I'm super hungry."

"I think I need to start bringing snacks to class." The boy scratched the back of his head.

"Geez. How much food do you eat?" Lucy laughed.

Natsu just shrugged, shoving his hands in his shorts pockets. "I move around a lot, and I'm really active, so I burn through calories really easily."

"Do you do any sports?" Lucy asked. She'd only known Natus for a solid seventy-two hours, so she was trying to learn as much about him as she could.

"Not anymore. I used to do a lot when I was a kid, but I stopped in high school." He explained.

"Why did you stop?"

Natsu chuckled. "Long story short, I got in a fight and got kicked off the team in high school."

"You got in a fight?" Lucy's voice was filled with alarm. She stopped walking and just stared at the guy, who was now a few steps ahead of her.

"I used to get in a lot of fights." Natsu cracked his knuckles as if to prove a point. "I always won though. Just ask Lisanna."

" I can't believe it. You're a delinquent." Lucy tried to process this. Was he ok to hang around if he was just going to cause trouble? Old habits die hard, and it was starting to sound like fighting wasn't exactly a new thing.

"Oh come on Luce. It was just some good ol' rough housing in the school parking lot. Everyone in my school did it."

Lucy completely ignored the new nickname she had somehow gotten. "The hell kind of school did you go to?"

"Public school." Natsu deadpanned.

There was a moment of silence between the two before Lucy just started walking again. A few steps in and she had started laughing. She couldn't help herself. For some reason she just found Natsu's response to be particularly amusing.

When they did make it to the dining hall, and each got their own plates full of food, they found Gray already sitting down at a table with some other guy. They sat down next to him, although Gray shot a funny look at Natsu. "Seriously Flamebrain? I have to live with you, and now you're making me eat with you too?"

"Sorry I'm an awesome person Iceprick."

"Oh stop you too." Lucy grumbled. "Don't ruin my otherwise good first day of classes."

"Whatever." Gray shrugged, then turned back to his conversation with the guy next to him.

Eventually Levy joined them. The group spent as much time as they could talking about their first impressions on their different classes and professors. So far it seemed like it was all good things. Even on the first day, there was already gossip going around the school. Apparently there had been comments about some of the more attractive first-year students, and even TA's for the intro level courses. They started a bit of their own gossip too. Conversation about the different people who lived on their respective hallways, and people they had classes with, started up. Since they didn't know everyone's names yet, most of the stories were told using physical descriptions rather than names.

From what Lucy could tell, the her first semester of college was starting off very well. The first day of classes alone was manageable. It also seemed like she would have a good group of people she could eat her meals with. Even though it was just lunch time now, there were already plans for a group to eat dinner together at five. All that was left was to make sure she didn't fall behind on her homework right from the get go. Procrastination wasn't something she made a habit of.


	4. Chapter 4

Nothing was more amusing than watching a bunch of desperate freshman attempting to buy certain beverages that they clearly knew nothing about. "The Gang", which at this point consisted primarily of Natsu, Lucy, Gray, Levy, and this other girl named Meredy that Gray had met in his psychology class. They were all sitting in Natsu and Gray's room. Gray sat with Meredy on his bed, while Lucy and Levy sat on Natsu's. Natsu himself sat backwards on a desk chair in between the two beds. He had a wad of cash in one hand, and his phone in the other, pressed against his ear.

"No, I told you, we have forty bucks between the five of us." He said through the phone. "...Yeah. I've got a written list for ya….. I know, I know."

"You have vodka on that list right?" Gray asked.

"Yes, I have vodka. Now shut the fuck up." Natsu hissed, covering the speaker on his phone with the palm of his hand. He then turned his attention back to the conversation. "Right. Meet you in the parking lot? On it."

With that, the conversation ended. The pink haired boy shoved his phone into his pocket and got up from his chair. "Alright. I'm gonna go meet the person real quick. She's heading out like, now."

"And she's not going to scam us?" Gray had a skeptical look on his face.

"Look man, Cana isn't about to skimp out on us here. She wants us to drink just as much as we want to get drunk." Natsu said as he headed opened up their dorm room door. "Plus, I don't see us having many other options, so trust me on this."

With that, Natsu left to go meet the sophomore who, for some reason, agreed to buy a bunch of underaged children alcohol. Lucy still wasn't too sure about the whole situation.

This was going to mark their first weekend on a college campus, and Lord knew that the world was going to explode. The combination of returning students who didn't get to party over the summers, and the little first years who were being released from their parents' rule for the first time in their life, was beyond terrifying. Lucy knew many people from her classes alone who were prepared to drink their livers away. As they had been chatting, Lucy discovered that Natsu had the most drinking experience in the group. He claimed to have been to several parties in high school, and pulled up pictures on his phone to prove it. He even showed off the case of Natty Light that his dad had bought for him upon moving in. Second on the list of drinking achievements was Gray, who had drunk before, but wasn't so much of a party go-er, which was the only reason his experience was limiting. Levy had gone to some parties over the summer, and drank three beers before being happily tipsy. Even Meredy had some amount of experience with alcohol. Lucy's experience ended with her one glass of wine at dinner parties her father would take her to. The most she had ever had in her life was two glasses at Easter.

Still, this group of barely experienced freshman somehow were some of the only ones she knew of who had an actual plan for getting their hands on liquor. It was six thirty when Cana got back from the liquor store. She showed up at the boy's dorm room with a very inconspicuous brown paper bag. She chatted for a little bit, wishing the gang the best of luck, before turning to walk down the hallway. Natsu and Gray were immediately interested in what the bag contained. They took out three glass bottles, and placed them on the floor side by side. The girls leaned over to inspect the labels. There was one very large bottle, that was covered in a label that faded from pink to yellow. The large text on the front read Svedka. Under that it said it was flavored like strawberry lemonade, which didn't sound awful. The next two bottles she at least recognized from movies and such. Jack Daniels and Fireball whiskey. Natsu quickly clung to the Fireball, which probably should have been concerning.

The group decided to part ways for a while. It wasn't quite time to start actually drinking yet, so they decided to take some time to get ready. Levy and Lucy both ran up to their room, bringing Meredy with them.

"What are you supposed to wear out?" Levy asked, pulling shirts out of her closet.

"I honestly have no idea." Lucy shook her head. She looked towards Meredy, who was leaning against Lucy's bed. The pinkette was currently wearing violet tank top and dark skinny jeans, with a black blue flannel tied around her waist. "Is that what you're wearing out?"

"Um, I think so." She responded, looking down as if to remember what she was wearing. "I don't really want to walk all the way back to my room to change so…"

"Where do you live?" Levy asked.

"CrimSor." Meredy saw the slightly confused looks. "Short for Crime Sorcerer. It's the one close to Hyberion Hall, all the way on south campus?"

"No way!" Levy was surprised. "I didn't know first years lived over there."

Meredy shook her head. "There's a handful of us, but it's mostly sophomores and juniors."

"Yeah, I don't blame you for not wanting to walk back." Lucy said, pulling a few shirts out of her closet, holding them up in front of herself in the mirror. "If you want to, you can borrow something to wear tonight."

"You sure?" Meredy asked.

"Yeah, of course!" Lucy smiled, immediately forgetting her own outfit to think of what would look good on the other girl. "Your shirt is super cute, but if you want something else to wear or shorts or a skirt or something, go ahead and pick one out."

"...Then… Do you have a dark skirt or something? Pants are going to get hot."

"Oh definitely." Lucy hunted through her dresser and produced a black skater skirt with an elastic waist. She handed it over to Meredy, who quickly slid it over her pants, before pulling those down to her ankles and eventually kicking them off.

It took a while, but eventually Lucy and Levy both had outfits. Lucy donned a white and gray striped crop top, that was tight fitting around her chest, but definitely not uncomfortably so, with a navy blue skirt. Her hair was tied up in a simple bun, just enough to keep it from getting in the way. Levy decided to go with a dress rather than a shirt and skirt. It was a lace dress that was cranberry in color, had short sleeves, and a skirt that cut a few inches above her knees. A thin black belt went around its waist with a small black bow on the front. Yet another head band tucked her hair back on her head.

By the time the three girls were fully dressed, and had played a little with each other's make-up, it was about eight o'clock. Time always does seem to go by fast when you're getting ready. Feeling confident in their looks, the girls went back down to the boy's room.

"Hey there pretty ladies. Come here often?" Natsu said as he opened the door. He had changed from his previous outfit to a black tank top with two thick, red stripes going across it, and dark khaki shorts.

Gray was sitting at his desk, wearing just a black t-shirt and a pair of jeans, with a water bottle in his hands. If the shot glasses or half empty juice and soda bottles were any clue, there was definitely not water in it. Music was playing off of a laptop, also on his desk.

Natsu closed the door behind the girls, and immediately offered them drinks. "I think we should all celebrate our first week of college with a quick shot. What do ya say?" Natsu didn't even have to finish his sentence before Gray was filling up shot glasses. Lucy waited to be handed hers, and stared down at the clear liquid in her. She decided in that moment that she didn't like that she could see through it. She looked towards Levy, who had her own shot glass in one hand, and a bottle of ginger ale in the other.

"Alright! Ready?" Natsu put his own shot in the middle of the little circle that they all seemed to be standing in, the rest of the group following suit. "Cheers!"

In one motion, the freshman all brought their respective drinks to their lips, tilting their heads back to fit all of the liquid into their mouths. The burn was like cleaning fluid mixed with hand sanitizer. It hung around in Lucy's mouth far longer than she would have liked. "Aaah. That's painful." She stuck out her tongue. The feeling of fire in her throat wouldn't go away.

"You get used to it." Gray said as he handed her a bottle of soda to wash down the taste.

"Maybe vodka's not your thing?" Meredy suggested.

"Hey Lucy!" Natsu slung an arm over her shoulder. "Wanna do a Fireball shot with me?"

"I can't believe you like that stuff." Gray spat, taking a swig of whatever was in his "water" bottle.

Before Lucy could say anything, another shot glass was being handed to her, this time with an orange-brown liquid.

"Come on Luce. Do this with me." The grin on Natsu's face was hard to say no to. So, she took the glass and held it up. One of Natsu's arms crossed around hers so that the duo were linked together. A grin, not quite as big as Natsu's, reached Lucy's lips right before they took the shot in unison. Fire and cinnamon flooded her mouth instantly. Lucy coughed for a moment when she swallowed the alcohol, but quickly recovered.

"That one wasn't as bad as the first." She announced.

The group of five sat around and drank together until just before ten o'clock. In that time they had had beers, shots, and taken sips from Gray's drink, which had been discovered to be a whiskey and coke. The dark haired guy kept refilling it, and as the night went on, and more alcohol was consumed, he stopped measuring out shots all together, and just added whiskey and soda in random amounts. Levy and Lucy sat on top of one of the beds, giggling together about the names of elements on the large Periodic Table that hung from Natsu's side of the room. They passed around a few beers, not bothering to pay attention to which one belonged to who. Lucy vaguely noticed the stench of alcohol in the dorm room, or the layer of sweat between her and Levy as they sat with their arms pressed together, or Meredy inching closer to Gray. Everything around her just seemed to be happening too quickly for her mind to actually pay attention to it.

For the first time in her life, Lucy could say she was sufficiently buzzed. It didn't feel like it was always described in the movies though, so it took until the group decided to leave the safety of the boy's dorm room and make the walk across campus, that she actually started to really _feel_ the effects. The best way she could describe how she felt would be 'fuzzy'. The world seemed to be moving faster than usual, and events blurred together. She didn't even know how their little group had gotten their destination, she just suddenly realized they were there.

While Magnolia College wasn't exactly a party school, they had their fair share of party atmospheres and traditions. One of which was gathering on the Greens. The Greens was the field out behind the townhouse area, known as the Crescents. Usually that space was reserved for upperclassmen housing. But, on a weekend night, it was the largest social gathering on campus. Everyone would meet up and stand around in the middle of the field, chatting away and mingling with random people.

A week into the school year, and Lucy was able to recognize some of the people there at least. A few were friends she had made in orientation, people she knew to live on her hallway, or people she had classes with. Most of them were complete strangers. She couldn't tell how old they were, but some stood around drinking right from glass bottles, while others attempted to conceal their drinks in soda bottles or travel mugs. In front of one town house, a group of guys had pulled out a school provided dining room table and were yelling over rounds of beer pong. Other girls, in very short dresses, shrieked as they jumped into each other's arms. There were puddles all over the ground, some were maybe caused by water, while others were clearly the effect of the shattered glass in the center of it.

Lucy stuck to her friends. She made sure that they never left her side even once. She and Levy linked arms, to make sure they never separated. That was when the two girls noticed the linked hands between a certain pink haired girl and raven haired boy, and immediately they started giggling and whispering in each other's ears.

"Oo~oh. You think they're gonna date?" Levy laughed through her words, pointing at Gray and Meredy.

"No, you think?" Lucy gasped. "How scandalous."

The girls started laughing louder together, which drew the attention of Natsu. "What? What's goin on?" He walked up to the two girls, holding a six pack with both hands. The roommates both looked at it, confusion on their faces.

"Natsu…." Lucy stared at the beers. "Where did that come from?"

The pink haired boy looked down at the items in his hands, then back at his friends. "I found it."\

"Hahaha! You found it?" Levy for some reason thought this was the funniest thing. "Where the fuck did you find a six pack?"

"I ran into a bunch of seniors, and I followed them back into their house, and I went into their fridge, and it was full of beer, so I took it." The boy explained his discovery of these beers very matter of factly. The girls on the other hand, were shocked and amazed.

"You what?!" Lucy couldn't believe this kid. "You stole them?"

"No. I found them." Natsu stuck his tongue out. "Come on Luce, it's not like I can give them back."

"Let's just drink them." Levy said, tapping her roommate on the shoulder. "It's not going to hurt anyone."

"You two….." The blonde looked between her two friends. "If we get found out I'm kicking your sorry ass Natsu."

The chemistry major just waved off the comment. "We can go down to the river to go drink them or something. No one will be there."

"Oooh." Levy cooed at the idea. "I like that."

"Fine. Docks it is."

After deciding on their destination, the trio turned around to look for the other two who had been with them, but the pair was completely gone. With the massive crowd that there was on the Greens, there was no way in hell they were about to find them.

"Let's just go." Natsu shrugged, and began walking towards the end of the townhouses, where they would be able to get to the main pathway that went through campus. The two girls followed after him, not really wanting to lose another member of the group after having lost two already. Gray and Meredy were quickly forgotten.

The walk to the docks was quick. The three freshman weren't so drunk that they were stumbling over their feet, but walking down hills was noticeably difficult. If not for the fact that they knew they needed to follow the brick, which led right around the pond, and passed Mermaid Heel, the all girls dorm, they probably wouldn't have been able to find their destination. The group walked across a road, and around the boat house, then they were on the river.

The river at night was a beautiful thing normally, but when all of the lights on the docks were a little blurry from the alcohol, it was even better. Levy, Lucy, and Natsu found a place along the docks to sit down, and hang their feet over the edge and into a cool river water. Natsu took out one beer for each of them. He used his keys to put the caps off of them. Lucy studied the label briefly. It said _SUMMER LOVE_ in big, Word Art letters, with what kind of resembled a baseball in the middle of the sun in the back. There were all sorts of weird colors and shapes on it that she couldn't quite make out. The freshman all cheered their bottles before taking the first sips from it.

"That's nasty." Natsu stuck out his tongue. He paused for a moment before taking another swig anyways.

"Anyone else tasting straight orange peel?" Levy asked.

"Definitely orange peel." Natsu confirmed. "And maybe just the slightest hint of ass."

The girls couldn't help but chuckle. "Congrats Natsu. You stole us a bunch of shitty beer."

Natsu just shrugged. "At least it's free?"

The rest of their time on the docks was spent forcing this beer down the hatch, and chatting when they could think of stuff to talk about. There wasn't a set topic, their minds just kept picking up one thing and dropping another. Occasionally one would pause their sentence to take a swig, only to hate the taste of their worst ever find.

The vibration of Natsu's phone paused conversation completely. The flame-head pulled his cell out of his pocket, taking a drink of beer as he checked it. "So…." He took a moment to figure out what he wanted to say. "Apparently Gray needs the room."


	5. Chapter 5

"You're a fuck boy."

The accusation was loud and clear for the entire group that stood in a circle on the patch of grass in between the main dorm buildings. Natsu tossed the frisbee to Gray, who caught it with a scowl on his face.

"I'm not a fuck boy." The raven threw the frisbee across to Lucy, who fumbled to catch it.

"Dude." Natsu looked at his roommate. "We've been here four weeks, and you've screwed five different girls."

"He's got a point." Lucy chimed in as she tossed the frisbee over to Levy. "How do you even have that kind of stamina? Don't you get tired of it?"

"There's no way it's been that many." Gray spat into the grass. He opened his hands in front of his chest, signalling for the small girl across from him to toss. Levy threw the frisbee, but it veered to the side. Gray watched the disks' movement with his eyes before running to catch it.

"Let's go down the list then." Levy said. "Meredy was the first one. Then there was the girl Mickey."

"I don't even really talk to either of them anymore." Gray shrugged. "Meredy got real weird and distant afterwards."

"The girl in your education class that came over to "study" last thursday." Natsu added in. "And whoever that green haired girl you met at that party was."

"That's only four." Gray hissed, tossing the frisbee aimlessly, waiting for someone to catch it.

"Oh great. One per week." Lucy rolled her eyes.

"See? Fuck boy."

The raven male huffed out air through his nostrils before grabbing the hem on his shirt and pulling it up and off his body. It was still hot out, and when the weather was nice, this campus got naked. Students walked around in their bathing suits to and from the river. They sunbathed on the docks, although some didn't feel like making the trip and just settled for laying on a patch of grass in the sun by their residence area. Gray was one of those students who repeatedly indulged himself in being as close to nude as allowed whenever possible. To be fair to him, he had everything and more to show off. He was in great shape, and well toned. He had a large, geometric iceberg tattoo on the right side of his chest, as well as a blue rose, decorated to look like an ice sculpture, extending from his left wrist to the middle of his forearm.

Natsu was in a similar state of dress to his roommate. His tanktop had been ditched before even leaving the building, and was now bundled up on the ground with his sandals. The white scarf that he toted with him everywhere was tied around his forehead like a sweatband. Lucy and Levy were the sensible ones. The two girls were dressed in shorts and were quite good at keeping their shirts on.

"You know how I really know you're a fuck boy though?" Natsu asked as he dove to catch the flying plastic disk. He stood, wiping the dirt from his knee before chucking it across the clearing, making Lucy run for it. "I keep a pillow and blanket in their room because I've slept on their floor so many fucking times."

"He's got a point." Levy couldn't help the amused snort that left her. "Maybe we should just lay off the partying for a little bit? For Natsu's back's sake more than anything."

"Levy…" Lucy raised an eyebrow at her roommate. "Weren't you the one who said you wanted to drink your life away because of your last exam results?"

"I'm not a math person, and yet here I am, in fucking calculus." The blue haired girl began an all-too-familiar rant. "I hate these gen-ed classes."

"Oh come on. That exam wasn't _that_ bad." Natsu scratched the back of his head.

"Natsu, I don't mean to sound rude when I say this… And don't take this the wrong way…" Levy braced herself to catch the frisbee, and failed. She bent down to pick it up. "But sometimes I forget that you're smart."

"What the fuck?! I'm plenty smart!"

"Wow. That was some serious salt." Lucy looked towards her roommate.

The blue haired girl just shrugged. "Calculus has made me a horrible person."

"At least we only need to take one semester." The blonde sighed. She wasn't having as much trouble in the course as Levy was, but just like her roommate, Lucy was only in it because she needed to take at least one math course. "Although, I'll admit, it's not a completely awful class."

"You're a traitor to english majors everywhere."

"If you like calculus, you should take physics with me!" Natsu laughed when he saw Lucy scrunch her nose. He held his arms up in defence while the prospective english major made to whack him upside the head with a plastic disk.

"Or…" Gray picked at the skin around his nails when it became clear that the frisbee wasn't about to be thrown anytime soon. "You could do what I'm doing, change your major, and take Psych Stats."

The rest of the group groaned, having heard Gray brag about his lack of integrals on multiple occasions. Psychological statistics was a required course within the major. The real benefit to it though was that it also fulfilled that blasted math core requirement. So rather than suffering through a semester of trigonometry and derivatives, the most Gray ever had to do was plug some numbers into a Excel document, and let the computer do all the work. He tended to rub the matter into the unfortunate faces of his friends that had to suffer through it, regardless of their majors.

"If you guys need help with it, just let me know." Natsu more or less ignored Gray, instead continuing his conversation with the girl's in the group. Sometimes he did that; blatantly ignored his roommate for the pure purpose of annoying him. In all honesty, the two really didn't get along. They fought more than they agreed, it wasn't uncommon for punches to be thrown, they cursed each other out, called each other petty names. To sum it up, they were hot headed, and weren't afraid to get rough.

Eventually, they decided that their time playing frisbee had likely come to an end, and sat down in the grass to figure out what their next move was.

"Well," Lucy glanced at the clock on her phone. "We can always just reconvene for dinner."

"Hold on. Let me check the menu real quick." Levy pulled out her own phone and tapped open one of her many strategically organized apps. The dining hall on campus had its own regularly updated phone app that connected to an online menu for each meal served that day. It was a great way to get excited for a meal, think about what you wanted to eat, and the like. But with every day spent anticipating mozzarella sticks, there was undercooked, over-salted beef stroganoff. "Uh… Highlights look like chicken wings, corn bread... Meatloaf could be hit or miss. I don't even know what to think about what 'broiled mixed veggies' means."

"Wait but there are chicken wings." Natsu stopped everything, making sure to bring attention to the fact that buffalo wings where, in fact, very important.

"I'd be down for chicken wings." Insert the rare moment where Gray and Natsu agree on something. Of course, it just had to be food related though.

"Dining hall then?" Lucy made sure to clarify the plan. "Say, in an hour?"

"Hellz to the yeah." Before anyone could say anything else, Natsu was at his feet, gathering all of his stuff. "I might actually hit the gym for a bit first."

"Pardon my french for a moment here, but are you shitting me?" One blue eyebrow shot up Levy's forehead. The girl looked absolutely dumbfounded. "We just spent, what, an hour and a half outside chasing a frisbee, and you want to go work out?"

Natsu only shrugged. "Can't miss arm day?"

"Hey Flamebrain. I challenge you to a weightlifting context."

"Oh it's on. I'll outlift you any day Ice-snot."

"I don't even know what to do with them most days…."


End file.
